


a life in your shape

by pixiepower



Series: send me the moon [2]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: A Royal wedding, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Anal Sex, Enthusiastic Consent, Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, Loyalty Kink, M/M, Marriage, Porn with Feelings, Power Dynamics, literal love language, princess kkuma!, the tenderest possible use of that tag probably, titles/tithes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:46:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25503862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pixiepower/pseuds/pixiepower
Summary: Minghao’s hand found Seungcheol’s, sleeves shrouding where they were linked. Seungcheol doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to being attended to. This was a welcome reprieve.The fact that it took a wedding to achieve is not lost on him.
Relationships: Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups/Xu Ming Hao | The8
Series: send me the moon [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1884982
Comments: 14
Kudos: 105
Collections: Coup de Cœur - Round 1





	a life in your shape

**Author's Note:**

  * For [archaeocyaths](https://archiveofourown.org/users/archaeocyaths/gifts).



> title from “strawberry blond” by mitski.
>
>>   
>  _all i need, darling, is a life in your shape/_  
>  _i picture it, soft, and i ache_  
> 
> 
> this work is second in a series. it will make much more sense if you read the first one!
> 
> for isabel. thank you for always believing in me!

An eclipse is auspicious.

Boughs wind around the arch, deep blue ribbon woven among the cypress. The Crest flies above them. Seungcheol’s feet feel steady on the steps, and he can’t help but smile as he speaks.

His pronunciation is perfect. 

Cultivated with years of practice in the lamplight of Minghao’s chambers, motivated by the proud little look on Minghao’s face every time there was no trace of caution, no hesitation as his tongue wrapped around the words Minghao fed him. Reward enough then, even greedy as Seungcheol has let himself become over the years for Minghao’s gaze, or even worse, his praise.

This look, Minghao’s face here, at their altar, is nothing like that. Over all the regalia, layers and layers of blue and yellow, silk and embroidery like a garden blooming over his skin, Minghao’s eyes shine like the moon somewhere above them. He’s awash in pink, the sky shifting, breezes rustling the robes at their ankles like fingertips, and Minghao is glimmering at Seungcheol, standing tall and lean and eyes wet with emotion.

Seungcheol’s vows, in Minghao’s home tongue.

They had insisted on exchanging their own vows, for however brief a period the officiant might allow; something of this ceremony had to be theirs alone besides the hearts in their chests. The rest of this is for everyone else, the tabloids and the archives and the blogs and the eyes and eyes and eyes on them. So much of this belongs to the generations before them, the tea and the Seal and the bowing of heads and the swearing of loyalty to their Queen and kingdom, first and foremost. Seungcheol was prepared for that.

But Seungcheol professes love to Minghao in the language Minghao grew up speaking, tells him from half a meter away how beautiful he is, promises, promises. Takes the most important vows of his life for the second time over.

_“My devotion will never waver. I am yours. You, above all else, my Prince, my King, my heart.”_

Minghao’s eyelashes shimmer, heavy with dampness despite the even look on his face. Even now, this day of all days, he has to present himself in that practiced, princely way, crown balanced perfectly atop his head, gold catching like the dip of the sun on the spilled ink of his hair. But the way his eyebrows move when Seungcheol’s words tumble out, his eyes huge under the cable-knit of his brow, shocked and proud and bright with love and dark with wanting, an ephemera of cosmic emotion, betray the presence of the man that Seungcheol has been in love with for a very, very long time.

The moon passes over the sun, and where they touch a ring of eternal flame is forged, hundreds of thousands of kilometers from Earth. So big and beautiful the eye cannot behold it.

Seungcheol’s heart roars like the tide, and the sky goes purple as the officiant declares them married.

Minghao doesn’t wait. No sooner are the words leaving the officiant’s mouth that they seal their marriage, Minghao throwing himself at Seungcheol, kissing him so hard it nearly knocks the breath out of his lungs. They both know the ceremony is steeped in tradition and is, really, half for the press, all this history, gold regalia balanced on velvet cushions, but Minghao can’t help himself from tangling his hand in the back of Seungcheol’s hair, thicket and thorn, careful of the crown in Seungcheol’s curls, pulling him so tight Seungcheol thinks he might be kissed forever. Seungcheol knows he’s beaming, and the screaming of the throng on the other side of the gates washes over his ears, waves, loops, and eruptions.

He’ll read later that the media went wild, that they’re clutching their pearls, that _a prince would lose his decorum like that._ Debate will rage, apparently, and Jeonghan will text him a gif of every angle. In Seungcheol’s favorite the drone camera catches Minghao’s crown slipping off his head, kept from falling only by the pins tucked behind his ears no one else knows are there. _Appropriateness_ gets kicked around a lot. _Proper,_ and _sanctified._ Seungcheol doubts anyone is using the word _sacred_ in the way he’s become familiar with.

“Loving you is a revelation,” Minghao murmurs against the warmth of his neck in their marital bed, nose soft against Seungcheol’s pulse.

For the first time in a long time they were left blissfully alone, averted gazes and whispered well-wishes following them like comets’ tails as they made their way through the palace, robes heavy with propriety, a certain expectation clinging to the fabric. Minghao’s hand found Seungcheol’s, sleeves shrouding where they were linked. Seungcheol doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to being attended to. This was a welcome reprieve.

The fact that it took a wedding to achieve is not lost on him.

Seungcheol closes his eyes, runs fingers like memory over Minghao’s clavicle, the cool dip of his bare skin. “I love that you did that,” he admits quietly. “All that restraint, so carefully cultivated…” He blooms an invisible flower with his hand, as if, _poof._

Minghao whines a little, cheeks pink as Seungcheol scrolls through yet another article, leaving an anonymous _like_ on a netizen’s comment _(ahh kind of sexy… ㅋㅋ)._ “I couldn’t help it. We were standing there for hours, and you—”

Laughing, Seungcheol sets down his phone, turning to face his husband. Their noses bump before Seungcheol pulls back to look at Minghao’s face in the light. His hand finds the dip of Minghao’s waist, narrow as it is, fingers curling around it with ease, and Minghao’s giggle hitches in the middle, tapering off into the sweet sound of Seungcheol’s name. His mouth curls around both, one side pulling up.

There are no crowns here, no eyes but for theirs.

  
•

It almost feels like a time loop, the way Seungcheol and Minghao come together just to be wrenched apart by duty. 

He knew a honeymoon in the traditional sense was out of the question, with all of the kingdom’s political plans being laid out. But everything moved so fast before the wedding, and now it’s slowed down, molasses at their hands and feet. Trudgery. Seungcheol doesn’t know what a Prince Consort is meant to do, really, just smiles and bows and misses being at Minghao’s side. 

It feels selfish, to miss lacking influence, to miss letting Minghao bear the brunt of their responsibility. It was so much easier to watch and protect and love Minghao, to make that his sole duty, and now Seungcheol aches with acknowledgement and sympathy at all Minghao’s helpless frustration over the years. 

“You look tense,” says Seungcheol. It’s an understatement, Minghao’s jaw set tight and his body hardly swaying as he walks, brisk, pausing only enough to let Seungcheol fall into step with him.

Bureaucracy stifles Minghao, career politicians strategizing around him and blockading his proposals constantly. Seungcheol has had the so-called privilege of sitting in on some of the meetings where Minghao’s eyes were sharp and his words were sharper, but the others in the room, acting like they were born on the mahogany conference table, breezed past it with the minimum respect offered their Crown Prince and no more. All of Minghao’s preparation and research and anecdotal evidence for naught. Sisyphus on the hill, pushing and pushing with little to show for it, and all of that tension tears at his muscle now, sets his body rigid. 

Seungcheol may not be his guard in name anymore, but reading the language of Minghao’s body is not a skill so easily forgotten.

“I feel tense,” Minghao says, almost like a joke. His voice is kept purposely light, fairy feet on dewy leaves. His hands twitch at his side like he wants to rub at his face, and his footfall snaps against the marble like twigs underfoot.

This meeting must not have gone as Minghao hoped. There is a weight on him, whorled like a knot in a tree where the back of his neck stretches into his narrow shoulders. He reaches out for Seungcheol’s hand. Minghao’s silence speaks volumes, and the deliberately soft way his thumb runs over the veins at the inside of Seungcheol’s wrist as if to soothe himself gives Seungcheol an idea.

“Take me to bed, Crown Prince,” Seungcheol murmurs, soft against his lapel, velvet suggestion.

“Seungcheol…” Minghao laughs quietly, but his thumb presses in, finding its home in the divot of Seungcheol’s wristbone.

The pink of Minghao’s cheekbones is like a reward, the angle of his jaw when he tips his face upward somewhere between embarrassed and staving off desire. Seungcheol knows the feeling, biting at his tongue to tamp down a smile.

Seungcheol prods a little. “Our afternoons are both free today,” he says. “Relieve your stress with me.”

Their steps slow ever so slightly, footfall quieting among the polished stone in the hall. When Minghao turns his head just slightly to catch Seungcheol’s gaze, the look in his eyes pools heat in Seungcheol’s stomach, surprise coupled with something else that Seungcheol hasn’t seen in some time.

Minghao’s shoes click to a stop in front of what’s now _their_ room, chambers they share, and Seungcheol’s shoulders hit the door. He and Minghao look at each other, letting seconds pass like grains of sand carried out by the tide. Seungcheol’s eyes trace over Minghao’s expression and find all its aches and wishes.

“I live to serve,” Seungcheol says softly, only half-kidding. 

Maybe less.

He can see Minghao swallow, throat bobbing, and feels the door give under his weight. Before Seungcheol knows it his back is against the other side of the door, Minghao crowded up, pressed to his chest, and their mouths are finding each other. 

There’s power that simmers under Minghao’s skin, each kiss leaving Seungcheol weaker and weaker the gentler it is. Minghao’s lips brush Seungcheol’s, soft like a breath, even as his hands move with purpose, roughly pushing buttons through buttonholes. His mouth is all silk and fawnlily, delicate petals blooming, pushing through the soil to reach for the sun, and his hands are just as soft.

“Let me be what you need,” Seungcheol sighs between kisses, watching Minghao’s eyes flash with interest as Seungcheol’s shirt is pushed off and slips to the floor atop their shoes, clumsily toed off. “Let me—”

“You want to _serve_ me?” murmurs Minghao. “Protect me? Be my _guard?”_

The tone of his voice drips down Seungcheol’s throat under his crest necklace, honeysuckle and blackberry. Even with the purposeful tone, Minghao sounds as wistful as Seungcheol has been feeling lately, imbuing all that longing with sweet tea and heady desire, filling Seungcheol’s head with a steamy fog. It’s easy to tell that Minghao misses how simple things used to be, too, how before all of this it was just them. Even if it was never _just them,_ really, at least they got to steal away so much more before.

All the more reason to cherish this blissful afternoon with no meetings, no bureaucrats, no nosy press or obligations. Minghao’s crown _clinks_ against Seungcheol’s on the bureau, and Minghao runs both hands through Seungcheol’s soft curls with a satisfied sigh.

“Yes. Always. Please.” Seungcheol lets himself say it with all the honesty it deserves. A large part of him misses it. He wants it, even if the only place he can have it now is here.

Seungcheol is tugged familiarly into their bed, Minghao’s hands pushing at his shoulders. His fingers curl around the muscle there, trimmed nails raking over Seungcheol’s deltoids, tongue caught between his teeth. The way Minghao makes quick, deft work of both of their clothes and looks at Seungcheol, laid bare for him, makes him feel like something precious, the delicate, blossoming thing Seungcheol always thought Minghao was.

What a beautiful error to make. It is much headier instead to embrace reciprocity, to see that Minghao is more root than petal, to remember that Minghao can just as easily move heaven and earth as he can be willowy and polite and soft-spoken and _princely._ For all of Seungcheol’s thew, he knows this to be true: 

“You don’t need protection, my love.”

 _Not from me,_ he doesn’t say. He doesn’t need to; Minghao’s laugh is sweet, that fond giggle Seungcheol loves so much, and he captures Seungcheol’s mouth with his own, plush mouths fitting together perfectly.

“Mm,” Minghao hums as he slides his lips across Seungcheol’s jaw. “Maybe so.” His teeth nip at the bone. “You want to see what I can do to you.”

It is not a question. Seungcheol’s next inhale is sharp.

Minghao’s kisses flutter down Seungcheol’s neck, teeth scraping at the tendon and sending a shiver like electricity down his spine. He moves across Seungcheol’s collarbone, pressing a kiss to his crest pendant at his chest. Minghao’s mouth is soft against the insides of Seungcheol’s thick biceps as he noses them up one at a time, nipping gently at the translucence of Seungcheol’s wrists when his hands hit the pillow. Ivy and vine, Minghao’s long fingers wrap loosely around both of his hands. Their hands tangle together haphazardly as he swings a leg over Seungcheol’s body, knees bracketing him and bearing all his weight down on his hips. It sends fire licking through Seungcheol. 

Like this Minghao looks at home. Exercising his might atop a throne. All that understated strength used now to pin Seungcheol below him, hands held above his head and body all but prostrate under him. 

Seungcheol’s heart pounds in his chest, broad shoulders spread out in reverence and pinned easily under whipcord and sinew. There are veins like lightning struck down the lean muscle of Minghao’s arms. Seungcheol ought to be laid out for his prince like this more often. On offer, for the taking.

For all his day to day, Minghao so rarely wants to wield his power here, so rarely wants to pull and push, but when he does…

Everything is wearing on Minghao, Seungcheol can see it; how even after their wedding he is treated not like a future King but instead like a novelty, the sweet Crown Prince, friend and ally to other kingdoms but peripheral to his own.

It is impossible for Seungcheol to forget just how strong Minghao is. Everyone else seems to know only the delicate shape of him, lithe limbs and long fingers and diplomatic smile. Seungcheol knows more intimately than anyone Minghao’s delicate shape. But he also knows more intimately the fortitude Minghao possesses, both mental and physical.

He wants Minghao to let some of that go and just _take_ for once. He deserves it.

A ragged moan tumbles out of Seungcheol when Minghao’s hips roll back and slide against him, bare and wet and hard, settling his weight over his thighs. “I love you. Take me. Everything is yours.”

“Oh, I will,” Minghao says, opening the box from the side table and retrieving what he needs. “But first I’m going to take care of you.”

He wets his hand and returns the dry one to Seungcheol’s wrists, long pretty fingers pressing them to the pillows, crest ring and wedding ring glinting on the way. He’s staring long and heavy at Seungcheol’s expression as he opens him up, sight unseen. One finger inside him, then two, curling just right, just _perfect,_ target-practice accurate like arrows singing through the air. Sense memory guides Minghao, and before long Seungcheol is panting under him, trying not to get ahead of Minghao despite how the bubbling desperation inside him wants to meet his hand. 

“Look at you. So lovely, xīngān.”

Minghao would sound smug were it not for his soft eyes, teeth catching the corner of his lower lip, watching Seungcheol reduce before his eyes, boiling hot and syrupy into a quivering mess under him. Wielding his knowledge and his prowess like a scepter in hand. 

All of his strength, of course, but more importantly all of his _kindness._ Aimed so solely at Seungcheol. It’s overwhelming.

Another press of fingers, angled just so, and Seungcheol is writhing and crying out. “Minghao, Minghao, _Crown Prince, please,”_ he begs, not knowing or caring what frantic phrases spill from him, just wanting more.

The use of Minghao’s title yanks his fingers out of Seungcheol, surges him forward to sink his teeth into Seungcheol’s neck, mouth sliding over his flushed skin before thinking better of it. On his next heaving breath Minghao is pressing their chests together, kissing Seungcheol filthy deep and sinful loving, noses nestled against one another like he can breathe him in quicker through their mouths connected. A direct route to his lungs, his heart. Seungcheol gives them up readily.

“Seungcheol.”

“Yes, anything,” Seungcheol breathes against Minghao’s lips, body tingling with want.

Catching his breath, Minghao touches his forehead to Seungcheol’s. “Will you trust me?”

“Always, Crown Prince.” A smile breaks over Seungcheol’s face. His next breath is a fond, deep one. “It would be impossible not to.”

Pink blooms over Minghao’s cheeks, some mixture of bashfulness and pride and lust, sins professed only to Seungcheol. He kisses Seungcheol hard, eyes darkening at the way Seungcheol’s arms tense above his head, hands flexing when he runs the pads of his fingers over where Seungcheol is ready for him.

Minghao’s hand relinquishes its hold on Seungcheol’s wrists so he can move back and push Seungcheol’s legs apart. His fingertips trail over the sensitive insides of Seungcheol’s thighs, petal-soft, and he sighs out a longing breath at the sight of him like he’s not allowed this. 

It thunders through Seungcheol like the hoofbeats of wild horses, knowing that every good thing in Minghao’s life feels stolen away. It makes him want it that much more. He feels desperate for it.

Minghao can tell, Seungcheol knows it. He feels it too.

A long breath punches out of Seungcheol at the feeling of Minghao pressing in all at once. No hesitation. Just trust.

It would be almost too rough if Seungcheol’s body weren’t so open and wanting, Minghao moving back and forth in tiny, aborted movements like he absolutely needs to do it, needs to _take._

When taking is giving, and giving is taking.

“Yes,” Seungcheol breathes, body alight. _Give it to me. Take what you need._ “Yes—”

Both of Minghao’s hands press at Seungcheol’s stomach, claiming his abdominal muscles, nails blunted and fingers splayed wide. Minghao is driving into Seungcheol, absolutely letting go, all pistoning hips and careening present. 

Before Minghao, Seungcheol hadn’t known it could be like this, so hungry and needy and hot, Minghao’s face focused and flushed and wanting. “Oh, xīngān,” he pants, hair damp with sweat falling into his face.

Each inhale is a gasp, each exhale a broken sound or a moan. Seungcheol’s hands grip handfuls of soft, downy pillow like grasping at clouds, the deep-blue pillowcase between his fingers going taut with each thrust, and Minghao is just looking at Seungcheol like that. Like he is the sun.

Giving up his own strength to let Minghao push him around, break him down and build him back up again, is an utter gift after years of Seungcheol’s physicality being representative of his role. Seungcheol is Minghao’s everywhere, but nowhere is it more apparent than in their bed, where he is more than happy to help his prince take out his frustrations. 

Seungcheol’s body was always the barrier between Minghao and the world, after all.

Some things never change.

It’s healing, for both of them to fall apart like this, for Seungcheol to relinquish control, to let Minghao take over and sweat and work and actually have something to show for it. For each effort of his to punch out an immediate reaction, each push of his hips to result in a keen or a whine or just a choked-off exhale of Minghao’s name. A direct feedback loop, telling Minghao, _you’re good, you’re good, so good to me,_ whether in word or in spirit.

There’s a catharsis that comes from it, an absolution in the form of Minghao’s mouth and hands and cock, that Seungcheol couldn’t name in a press release or in the halls of the palace even if he wanted to. 

And he does not. 

This is theirs alone.

“Fuck,” Minghao swears, burying it in Seungcheol’s neck, and the rare sound of it in his sweet voice tightens everything in Seungcheol’s body. “You feel so good around me,” Minghao whines, and Seungcheol arches to meet him where he is buried. A seam plucks loose in the pillowcase from tugging it between his hands above his head, he can hear it, the only sharp thing in a room full of warmth and fog.

“My prince,” Seungcheol begs. His body is on fire, and his husband, his liege, is unspooling him with expert touch.

Choking back a strangled sound, Minghao slides his hand between them and wraps a hand around Seungcheol, thumbing sweetly over the head where it’s leaking for him. “Your _husband,”_ he reminds him, jerking tight and wet and messy, coaxing a high keening noise from Seungcheol’s throat. After a moment he seems to consider it again, and agrees quietly, voice tight, “Your prince.”

Seungcheol is so close to coming, and he tries to tell him as much. “Minghao, yeobo, I’m—”

“I know, I know, just wait, xīngān, soon, I’ll take care of you, I promise,” Minghao soothes, pushing in harder and harder, the sound of it obscene and unbecoming, his voice ragged-purple even as he coos at his husband, fawnlily-violet with desire.

He wants to, so badly, but Seungcheol can’t make it if Minghao keeps fucking him like this, he’s so close, too close, whining, _“Minghao—”_

 _“Wait.”_ It’s—it’s a royal command, the dark tone of it grit between Minghao’s teeth, and the desperate look in his eyes stalls Seungcheol’s whole body as Minghao’s hand tightens on his side and he thrusts into him faster and harder and _deeper._

“Yes, Crown Prince,” Seungcheol gasps, body going rigid and back arching, and he tears the pillowcase in earnest, the noise sharp and unfamiliar in their bed. The shreds of silky fabric tangle in his fingers.

“Oh, God, you—” Minghao’s eyes flicker between Seungcheol’s white knuckles and the expanse of his neck where his head is thrown back in pleasure. 

Minghao muffles an outpour of incredulous, anguished, high-pitched noises against the back of his hand, and suddenly he’s shaking apart, fingers digging into Seungcheol’s waist, each broken noise a half-moan as he pulls himself impossibly closer into Seungcheol’s body, emptying himself. Like struck lightning on willow. Stripped bare. 

“Come for me, Seungcheol, you’re so lovely—you—God, love, come for me, please.”

Minghao is breathing frantically as he scrapes his teeth against Seungcheol’s neck, stroking him off in a quick rhythm. It seems like he can hear the beats of it in his mind, meeting each helpless roll of Seungcheol’s hips with a heartbeat of soft praising murmurs under Seungcheol’s ear.

As soon as Minghao whispers, “You’ve served me so well, please let me do this for you,” Seungcheol cries out, shuddering and whimpering as he falls apart under Minghao’s weight, spilling wet and plenty into his hand, fingers clutching at frayed silk above their bodies.

It takes what feels like days of sunrises and sunsets for Seungcheol to catch his breath, and when he finally can breathe again Minghao has pulled away just a little and is kissing his cheeks, the insides of his biceps, coaxing his hands down from where they’ve pinned themselves against the bed. His lips are curled up in a smile he can’t stifle, and his eyes are so soft Seungcheol almost can’t bear to look at him.

What has he ever done to deserve this?

“Oh, ow,” Seungcheol groans. His arms come down, Minghao’s thumbs rubbing out the pins and needles pricking under his skin.

“You tore the pillowcase,” Minghao laughs. It’s breathless with incredulity and fondness.

Seungcheol flushes. “I’m sorry.”

Slowly, Minghao’s hand slides through the mess on Seungcheol’s stomach up to his chest, fingertips finding the gold and enamel crest where it’s stuck with sweat to his sternum. “Don’t be. You’re so sexy, Seungcheol. My handsome guard. My handsome prince.”

“Prince Consort,” Seungcheol replies quietly against Minghao’s temple, almost like an afterthought, taking deep, mindful breaths to steady the tremors that still thrum through him periodically. 

Minghao hums, reaches behind Seungcheol’s head to flip the torn pillow over and curl up around his side, long legs tangled with Seungcheol’s. “I know,” he murmurs, and his next exhale is resigned. “I know. I miss it so much. I thought—I thought everything would get easier now that we’re married. That I could… I’m sorry I couldn’t…”

His voice catches, and he buries whatever the end of his sentence would have been into Seungcheol’s shoulder. Seungcheol’s heart clenches, a tightness like a fist bolting up his throat.

“Minghao. You have done everything you can to protect me.” 

Of this Seungcheol is completely sure. 

Even without asking, there is not a single shadow of a doubt that Minghao has gone above and beyond to ease Seungcheol’s transition, thinking not of the eyes on himself as he moves closer and closer to enthronement but of the ones on Seungcheol, the ones with raised eyebrows that their dainty, beautiful Crown Prince would bed and wed some nobody.

Minghao’s father the King has been some help, if only in word alone. He had married the Queen some time after her enthronement, after years of traditional courtship befitting noble stock. The title he received then was different than Seungcheol’s now. _Fùmǎ,_ he said, eyes gentle on Seungcheol, _is not an easy title to bear. There is expectation weighing on you constantly, but nobody knows exactly what they’re asking of you._ Seungcheol knows what that means, how that feels. He’s finding himself held to an invisible standard, has to find needles in haystacks while wearing hide gloves.

Seungcheol can’t bring himself to ask Minghao for anything, but knows nonetheless that it was partially Minghao’s involvement that spurred Yoona’s request that he spend more time on the training grounds, the other, more pressing half of the reason being her wife’s pregnancy.

It is, second to Minghao’s side, the place where Seungcheol feels most at home, after all.

“I wish I didn’t have to,” Minghao sighs, wrapping and unwrapping his finger in the chain of Seungcheol’s necklace. “I wish they would just respect you. Respect us. Is that so much to ask?”

“You’ll be king one day.”

The implied meaning lingers. _You can do something about that,_ Seungcheol doesn’t say, knowing full well that Minghao could never, would never, be the kind of king for whom might matters more than heart. People over politicians, without question.

“I love you,” Seungcheol says instead, because that matters most right now.

Minghao cranes his neck to press a kiss to the corner of Seungcheol’s jaw. When he pulls back and props himself up on an elbow, he smiles wanly, his eyes saying, _I love you, too,_ even through the exhaustion, where both the athletic sex and the day are starting to catch up with him.

“When I was little our family used to go camping a rew times a year.” Seungcheol pushes a hand through Minghao’s hair and running a thumb over his eyebrow, over his cheekbone. “The four of us would drive out to Biseulsan in my dad’s old car, and my mother would pretend she wasn’t worried that the car wasn’t going to make it even though it was only a thirty-minute drive. And my brother and I would run out to collect sticks to feed the fire even though my father started it with store-bought tinder, and the thing I remember most about it, besides the time Seungmin put a toad down the back of my shirt—”

Minghao giggles at the feeling of Seungcheol’s hand wiggling between his shoulder blades, curling in closer to Seungcheol’s side,

“—is my mother telling us that the most important thing is to leave a place better than you found it.”

The duties and obligations of a Crown Prince are a little different than that of an eight-year-old, but Seungcheol knows Minghao will know what he means. In this life you are dealt your dirt, you set your supports down, and you try to build something for yourself, and the only thing you can do when you pick up is try to make things more beautiful. You pick up someone else’s litter, and you brush dirt over embers, and while you take memories, you can leave the earth in a stronger place than when you started. That is all anyone can do. Try to be better.

Seungcheol tilts Minghao’s head back just slightly and touches their foreheads together, sweat cooled and hair curled at the edges. “You can’t fix everything, but you’re always going to do your best to. That’s what will make you a good king, and what makes you a good man.”

Minghao presses his lips to the divot in Seungcheol’s cheek, then his lips, soft and slow. He murmurs, “I know. I just want it to be enough.”

“It may not always be enough,” Seungcheol admits. The world has a way of being cruel, launching you ten steps back with each one you take to move forward. Minghao walks against the wind every day in his conference rooms. “But you will always be more than enough.”

“I love you, Seungcheol.”

Seungcheol laughs quietly. “If you love me you won’t let anyone see what I did to the pillowcase.”

Minghao snorts a little, tugging Seungcheol in by the necklace for another kiss, more heated but ultimately sweet. “Only you would tear perfectly good duan with your bare hands,” he says, tone heavy with desire. He runs a hand over Seungcheol’s bicep and sighs dreamily before trailing back down and twining their hands together, wedding rings casting shadows in the midday light.

“It’s so wasteful…”

“Mm, well, I could have Jun do something with it for us, if you’d like, xīngān,” Minghao muses with his faux-casual air, thumb running over Seungcheol’s pulse point and circling his wrist with his thumb and forefinger meaningfully.

Heat rises from the embers in Seungcheol’s chest. “I think that’s a good idea.”

The sound of Minghao’s laughter is tinder and kindling. The fire roars on, Seungcheol a ring of stone around it.

•

“Oh, God,” Seungcheol groans, hands clutched to his chest where his heart turns over.

He’s already out of breath from running cardiovascular exercises with Yoona’s latest batch of trainees, triceps and deltoids still aching in his black t-shirt, embroidered on the sleeves with the Guard’s symbol, from leading weight regimen. 

What was formerly a symbol of the Crown’s power alone is now a symbol of change, of reform, of Yoona and Seungcheol’s plan to expand the guardship into a tool of community action and activist support rather than just the private and elite. _If we have all this power, it ought to be redistributed. Stewardship, not guardship._

Seungcheol sweeps his jacket on as he takes the steps two at a time up from the training grounds, the world awash in green and sunlight beating warm on his scalp. His crown is tucked away in a box this afternoon, and there’s a sense of calm that runs through him, like he’s a little more himself without it.

His title remains without the symbol. Seungcheol doesn’t need it as a reminder of who he is. Everyone’s respectful bows and deferent addresses do that plenty. Seungcheol is _Prince Consort,_ of course, but in his heart that pales in comparison to _husband,_ bound by the wedding ring on his finger, and _guard_ and _love,_ pressed delicate and strong against his chest by his Crest necklace.

He stops dead in his tracks as he rounds the corner and opens the door to their chambers, feet skidding to a halt just inside. Some strange duet of laughter and panting reverberates out into the hall, a personal orchestra warming up.

Seungcheol’s heart tumbles into a bass drum, joining the cacophony in perfect time and rumbling harmony. “Oh, God,” he repeats, aortas rushing love through his body faster than blood cells.

Minghao looks up from where he’s sitting, long-legged and beautiful, on the floor, royal tile surrounding him as far as the eye can see. He turns the fluffy little thing in his hands to face Seungcheol, pretty fingers getting buried in the shag of white fur. “Hi, appa!” he says in a sweet little voice, holding the dog up at arm’s length to look Seungcheol in the eye. There’s a little gold clip with a gemstone in it pinning bangs out of their brown eyes. A crown, more ornate than Minghao’s own.

“Who is this?” Seungcheol breathes with the last few atoms of air in his lungs, collapsing to his knees. Minghao sets the dog down to kiss the dimple in Seungcheol’s cheek, then his lips, and Seungcheol lets the puppy clamber over his lap, tiny paws sinking into his thighs while his smile is busy pressing against Minghao’s.

Beaming, Minghao says, “That’s up to you. What would you like to name her?”

She must take after Minghao, because she licks first the apple of Seungcheol’s cheek, then his nose. Minghao’s eyes are soft as he watches Seungcheol fall, hook, line, and sinker for the heart-shaped pads of her paws and the tiny _yips_ she lets out when her nails click against the gold buttons on his jacket. They must be cold. Seungcheol rubs at her soft little feet with his thumbs, and her tongue lolls out.

“You like her?”

“My life began today,” Seungcheol says solemnly. “My first memory is seeing Goguma and everything before that is darkness. The Big Bang.”

Minghao’s face lights up, eyes wide with delight. _“Sweet potato,”_ he coos, his barely contained glee bowling his body over. He lies down beside Seungcheol, seemingly afloat in a sea of ceramic and marble and love. Seungcheol feels much the same, especially when he says, “Gānshǔ, Kkuma, tell me about your appa? He seems like someone handsome I ought to get to know.”

It sets Seungcheol off giggling, and the jostle of it means Kkuma abandons the warmth of his lap in favor of trampling Minghao’s chest, her little nails sliding on the silk finish of his jacket, and she plops down with her face resting on Minghao’s throat, wet nose pressed against his skin.

Seungcheol can imagine Kkuma quickly becoming the crown princess for all she is in charge of Seungcheol, her soulful brown eyes second only to Minghao’s in his heart and in ability to get him to do anything.

“He has a heart of gold, I think,” Minghao says to Kkuma conspiratorially. “It might be love at first sight.”

“Minghao…” Seungcheol sighs, smile melting over his face as he rolls over and gets one hand on Kkuma’s back, the other beside Minghao’s head where his crown is pinned stiff into his hair, and leans in to kiss him. He’s stopped with a finger to his lips.

“You’ve been working so hard, and I have good news.”

Seungcheol raises an eyebrow. “Better than our daughter?”

His ready adaptation to fatherhood knits Minghao’s face together in confusion, but sudden realization smooths it out as swiftly as it came. His laughter bubbles into Seungcheol’s grin from the proximity, and Seungcheol lets it fill his lungs and heart. “Maybe not. But they finally let me reallocate some of the funds saved from the guardship into the schools on the Xianshuihe line. It’s not everything I asked for, but I managed to get them to commit to twenty-seven percent, so—”

“Oh! That’s incredible, yeobo. My prince.” Seungcheol beams, and Minghao lets himself be kissed, then, his arms winding around Seungcheol’s neck. His fingertips find the clasp of Seungcheol’s necklace like force of habit, magnetized to it even after all this time. Seungcheol hopes they never lose this, pressing pride and warmth against each other’s lips in a space just for them, just for a few stolen moments, the rest of the kingdom out on their doorstep.

Kkuma barks, wriggling out from between where their bodies are starting to press together, closing any space remaining between them. Her tiny nails clack and slide around the slippery polished floor, picking up speed so fast her clip flies out of her fur.

Seungcheol thinks he knows how she feels.

It’s not easy, all of this. 

They step and they skid and they stumble. Seungcheol meets with prosecutors and commissioners and reporters and wishes Minghao was at his side, imagining long delicate fingers twining with his to keep him steady. Minghao receives his people. He makes fewer promises now than he used to, not wanting to use words someone else will poke holes into and render empty. 

They let their names get dragged through the mud, gold dulled in dirt, the sun dropped into darkness by the moon.

But he and Minghao keep pushing, keep trying, keep moving forward, and at the end of their long day they return to each other, and they build a life. For themselves, for each other, for their kingdom.

With some effort, Minghao tugs his crown off and shakes out his hair, leaning up onto his elbows. He smiles at Seungcheol. Seungcheol smiles back.

**Author's Note:**

> a note: 驸马, romanized here as _fùmǎ,_ roughly translates to _prince consort_. in historical chinese context it has typically referred to the husband of a crown princess/ruling princess.
> 
> thank you for reading!
> 
> find me on [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/pixiepowerao3) and [curiouscat](http://www.curiouscat.me/pixiepower/)!


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